Monday, November 30, 2015

Telefónica Business Solutions, which offers a wide range of integrated communication solutions for the B2B market, announced a global collaboration agreement with Huawei to promote the migration of traditional IT services to the cloud.

The agreement is aimed at helping enterprises to migrate their servers to the cloud, allowing them to use computing, storage and backup services in Telefónica’s data centers with no infrastructure investment required and on a pay per use basis.

Huawei will deploy the Telefónica’s Open Cloud service based on OpenStack in eight Telefónica data centers. Telefónica will use Huawei’s knowledge and experience on its public cloud service in the Chinese market. The first countries where the service will be deployed are Brazil, Mexico and Chile during the first quarter of 2016 and in five additional locations later on also next year.

Telefónica said the deal provides it with access to the latest technology levering on the economies of scale enabled by a global provider such as Huawei, which together with competitive pricing will enhance Telefónica’s value proposition in the cloud services market while making easier for enterprise customers to securely move their data to the cloud. The services offered include virtual servers, storage and physical servers, also known as "baremetal".

"With this agreement Telefónica will be better positioned to serve the needs of thousands of enterprises that require an easily scalable platform in the cloud at a competitive cost and with full reliability and security. This is all possible thanks to Telefónica’s capabilities providing end-to-end service management including the network and data center. The smart combination and scale of Telefónica’s and Huawei’s capabilities reinforce both companies and furthermore represents the best guarantee for our customers" said Juan Carlos López-Vives, CEO Telefónica Business Solutions.

“This global collaboration agreement represents a unique milestone in our long successful partnership with Telefónica, and will certainly have a big impact in promoting the migration of enterprises to the cloud and the digital world in all Telefónica footprint. Joint innovation capabilities, customer focus, global scale will allow us to sustainably bring cutting-edge solutions and differentiated offers to our enterprise clients” said Ryan Ding, Huawei’s Executive Director of the Board and President of Products & Solutions. http://saladeprensa.telefonica.com/

Telefónica presented its new strategic plan for coming years under the slogan “We choose it all”.

In a corporate event in Madrid, César Alierta, Executive Chairman of Telefónica, said his goal is to transform the company into an “Onlife Telco”, which he defines as "a company that promotes connections in life for people to choose a world of infinite possibilities." The event was streamed to the Group's 125,000 employees in 20 countries.

The new strategic plan is founded upon six key elements, three for value proposition –outstanding connectivity, integrated offering, and differential experience- and three facilitators, which will be Big Data and Innovation, end-to-end digitalisation, and capital allocation and simplification.<br />
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“We are experiencing an true revolution... This is not just another revolution. It is already being shown to be the revolution that will have the greatest impact of all of human history in terms of generation of wealth. The social development it brings will be more than exponential. And we are lucky enough to be at the centre of this revolution. The future will be a better one because we find ahead of us an era of exponential change and growth. A whole new world of opportunities is open to everyone, in any location, to create a better world”, stated Alierta.

Analytics and data visualization -- Delve Analytics provides interactive dashboards that surface insights into how users spend their time and who they spend it with, so they can focus on the tasks and people that matter most.

Advanced security and compliance -- Customer Lockbox offers customers control over access to their data in Office 365 by giving them ultimate approval rights in the rare instances when a Microsoft engineer must request access to the service. Office 365 Advanced eDiscovery brings machine learning and text analytics that reduce the costs and risks inherent in managing large quantities of data for e-discovery.

Dynamics CRM 2016 is now generally available for online and on-premises deployments. Dynamics CRM 2016 includes advancements in intelligence, mobility and service, with significant productivity enhancements to help businesses and customer-facing employees achieve more.

AppDynamics, a start-up based in San Francisco, announced co-engineering, co-marketing, and co-sales agreements with Accenture, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft, Pivotal, Rackspace, and Red Hat.

AppDynamics offers an Application Intelligence Platform that helps businesses proactively monitor, manage, analyze and optimize complex software environments, providing real-time, actionable IT operational and business insights into application performance, user experience, and business outcomes — all in real time. AppDynamics and its partner ecosystem help ensure maximum application and business performance, greatly improved DevOps collaboration for faster delivery, and enhanced analytical insight leading to better decision-making.

At a company event in Las Vegas, AppDynamics also confirmed a $158 million funding round led by General Atlantic and Altimeter Capital. The company's other investors include Adage Capital, Cross Creek Advisors, Industry Ventures, Goldman Sachs, Greylock Partners, Institutional Venture Partners, and Lightspeed Venture Partners.

Alcatel-Lucent is upgrading Orange Romania’s existing long-haul microwave transport network, allowing Orange to enhance its 4G network capacity and performance. Orange Romania’s 4G network covers 70 percent of the population and 96 percent of those in urban locations, with higher speeds of up to 300 Mbps now available in six major cities as well as throughout Bucharest’s metro rail network.

Under the project, which will be completed in 2016, Alcatel-Lucent will migrate its own microwave links to the 9500 Microwave Packet Radio technology across Romania, replacing existing Alcatel-Lucent microwave transport links. Network management will be provided by the 5620 Service Aware Manager. The 9500 MPR offers superior capacity for legacy TDM and new Ethernet traffic.

Iguaz.io, a start-up based in Israel, announced $15 million in Series A funding for its data management and storage solutions for Big Data, IoT and cloud applications.

The funding round was led by Magma Venture Partners, the funding includes additional investments from JVP and large strategic investors.

The iguaz.io founding team is comprised of a group of former executives from successful technology companies in the fields of storage, cloud computing, high-speed networking, analytics and cyber-security. These companies include XtremIO (acquired by EMC), XIV (acquired by IBM), Mellanox, Voltaire and Radvision (acquired by Avaya).

"Enterprise customers have been sharing their pain points and challenges with us as they try to adopt Big Data and predictive analytics in their business," said Asaf Somekh, co-founder and CEO of iguaz.io. "We designed our solution from the ground up to address these challenges and allow our customers to focus on their applications and business."

"The IT industry is undergoing major shifts with the spread of cloud technologies on the one hand and new data consumption requirements on the other," said Yaron Haviv, co-founder and CTO of iguaz.io. "We're leveraging state-of-the-art hardware with our novel software architecture enabling customers to take a leap forward in their data-driven businesses."

Orange and ENGIE announced a partnership to use their technological knowledge to achieve sustainable progress and economic and social development in Africa. The goal is to expand the electricity grid in Africa and encourage responsible power consumption. These solutions could, for instance, include individual solar kits and small-scale, local electricity networks. The service could then be billed via mobile using Orange Money. Both companies are participating in the COP21 conference in Paris.

Orange is present in 19 countries in Africa and the Middle East. ENGIE, which is an international player in the the energy sector, currently supplies 760 MW of power in Africa and aims to become one of the major energy leaders on the continent by 2025 with several major projects planned.

LG Electronics (LGE) has licensed Rambus' CryptoManager security platform for its next-gen mobile devices. The Rambus CryptoManager platform provides chip and device companies with end-to-end security throughout the design and manufacturing process. It includes a hardware root-of-trust for provisioning of keys to manage sensitive data on mobile devices. Specific terms of the agreement are confidential.

"At LGE, we are committed to ensuring that security is a key component of our industry-leading mobile devices," said Sang-won Song, vice president and head of LGE Mobile SoC Development Department. "With Rambus Cryptography Research team's advanced security expertise, the CryptoManager platform will help us secure mobile devices and applications throughout their lifecycle, providing critical trust among our customer base."

Saturday, November 28, 2015

The move to Network Functions Virtualization is certainly gaining steam. Increasingly, communications service providers are evolving their hardware-based infrastructure to new, next-generation communications networks. The rationale is simple – because of the many benefits offered by the virtualization of network functions including, but certainly not limited to, time-to-market for introducing new services and operational efficiencies.

One of the most critical network functions that communication service providers (CSPs) are looking to virtualize is the Session Border Controller (SBC), which is a vital element in today’s IP communication networks. The SBC is a software function that provides session security, interworking, and advanced session control for real time voice and video communications. Considering their standalone nature, SBCs have minimal dependencies on other key network functions and can evolve independently in terms of network infrastructure. They can also continually interface with other network elements using standard protocols such as SIP.

SBC virtualization provides CSPs with several benefits including:

•Cost efficiencies by leveraging general purpose datacenter platforms and shared infrastructure across multiple applications
•Service agility and faster time-to-market for new services and or new markets
•Operational simplicity for deploying and managing SBCs
•Evolution to cloud-based deployments to achieve dynamic scalability
•Removal of SBC vendor dependencies on hardware lifecycle
•Creation of virtual test environments

But even though the benefits of SBC virtualization are numerous, as with any new technology, there are considerations and challenges that CSPs should be aware of as well.

Make Sure You Have Clearly Defined Virtualization Goals

First and foremost, CSPs should have a clearly defined strategy and goals and know what they want to achieve with SBC virtualization. For instance, are they simply looking to virtualize the SBC function to leverage general purpose platforms in datacenters to reduce dependency on their SBC vendor’s hardware lifecycle and reduce costs? Or do they intend to fully embrace NFV cloud infrastructure to gain a broader set of benefits such as service agility, operational simplicity, dynamic scalability and more?

Given these questions, simple virtualization versus cloud virtualization is the first key decision CSPs need to make. That should be closely followed with the type of infrastructure they will need. The infrastructure requirements will be different for a simple virtualization strategy compared to NFV cloud virtualization.

Understand the Nitty Gritty of SBC Virtualization

The next important set of considerations is to understand how to run SBC as a virtual network function within a virtual or cloud infrastructure. It takes time and planning when considering an SBC virtualization strategy.

There are several things to consider, including:
•Readiness of datacenters to handle real time applications
•Performance assurance in shared infrastructure
•Carrier-grade Five 9’s reliability
•Infrastructure characteristics in terms of type of hardware, hypervisors and cloud
•Deployment strategy – (private, public, or hybrid cloud?)
•SBC virtualization framework
•Characteristics such as integrated versus distributed SBC architecture
•Service characteristics such as consumer, enterprise, mobile, wholesale or interconnect
•Scalability strategy of SBC in a virtualized environment
•Troubleshooting and management
•Cloud Infrastructure ecosystem support

Not all Virtual SBCs are Created Equally

One of the most important components of an SBC virtualization strategy is selecting the right solution and partner. There are several key considerations operators should make before selecting a virtual SBC. If CSPs want to leverage the full potential of cloud NFV deployments, the selection of an SBC must take into consideration whether the SBC is architected for cloud infrastructure such as NFV OpenStack or other similar implementations or if it is architected for just a simple virtualization to run on any general purpose server. Virtual SBC doesn’t always mean cloud NFV support. Make sure you clarify that in the vendor evaluation process.

CSPs should also consider the ecosystem support needed to run the virtual SBC in a multi-vendor cloud environment. It must seamlessly interface with the virtual infrastructure managers and cloud orchestrators that have been selected. In addition, it is important that a cloud infrastructure and virtual SBC solution is carrier-grade, one which ensures Five 9’s or greater reliability when carrying real-time traffic.

Another major consideration is deployment flexibility. The SBC should provide the flexibility to be deployed either as an integrated SBC with both signaling and media functions, or with distributed and separated signaling and media processing functions. Distributing the signaling and media independently brings several benefits in SBC virtualization strategy enabling operators to 1) make a step-wise evolution to the cloud by virtualizing signaling first, and media second, for better economies of scale for media processing such as transcoding functions; 2) gain datacenter optimization by maintaining separate networking infrastructure for signaling (1G) and media (10G); 3) gain cost efficiencies by sharing media resources across multiple signaling instances; and 4) improve quality and reliability by centralizing signaling control and localizing media closer to the customer.

The final major consideration is performance and scalability. One of the major adjustments CSPs have to make in the virtualization environment is a shift from receiving high scalability on a dedicated SBC platform to achieving similar scalability by running multiple smaller virtual SBC instances on a farm of general purpose servers – a recommended strategy for cloud deployment. But vertical scaling (rack and stack) of virtual SBC instances can introduce numerous new operational challenges in a large scale deployment. The virtual SBC should support cloud managers to provide the intelligence to dynamically scale up or down based on network traffic demands – a concept that is generally called elastic scalability in cloud deployments.

From a CSP’s perspective the benefits of deploying virtual SBCs in the cloud far outweigh any potential challenges. From providing consistency in services across geographic locations, to improving the quality of service and service availability, to operational simplicity, to service agility, SBC virtualization offers a great business case. We’re already seeing quite a bit of movement in the market to virtual cloud SBC environments - and that pace should only increase.

About the Author

Ashish Jain is Director of Solutions Marketing at GENBAND. He brings over 12 years of telecommunications industry experience with expertise in the areas of Real Time Communications for fixed and mobile networks, Wireless Security, Mobile OTT, and enterprise social media applications. In his current role as Director of Solutions Marketing at GENBAND, Ashish drives planning and strategy for mobile security products covering session border controller (SBC), Wireless Access Gateway, Diameter Signaling product line and manages IP based Real Time Communication solution portfolio covering VoLTE, VoWi-Fi, Small Cell, Carrier Wi-Fi, SIP Trunking, and IP Interconnect. Ashish holds a bachelor degree in Electronics Engineering and a Masters in Computer Science, with specialization in networks and communications, from The University of Texas.

Ericsson and Orange announced a trial of optimized, low-cost, low-complexity devices and enhanced network capabilities for Cellular IoT over GSM and LTE.

Some highlights:

Improved indoor coverage: The world-first EC-GSM (Extended Coverage) trial will be conducted in France using the 900 MHz band, with the aim to enhance device reachability by up to 20dB or a seven-fold improvement in the range of low-rate applications. This further extends the dominant global coverage of GSM in Europe and Africa to reach challenging locations such as deep indoor basements, where many smart meters are installed, or remote areas in which sensors are deployed for agriculture or infrastructure monitoring use cases. In addition, EC-GSM will reduce device complexity and thus lower costs, enabling large-scale IoT deployments. Another advantage of this technology is enablement by software upgrades of existing cellular networks, providing nationwide IoT coverage without additional hardware investments.

Reduced IoT device cost: In parallel, the world's first LTE IoT trial in partnership with Sequans will take place using low-cost, low-complexity devices with one receive antenna (instead of two), and half-duplex FDD .This simplifies the device hardware architecture and reduces expensive duplex filters, allowing for 60 percent cost reduction in comparison with existing LTE Cat 4.

Extended battery life: In partnership with Sequans, Ericsson will also demonstrate energy efficiency over GSM and LTE networks with Power Saving Mode (PSM) technology. The PSM feature is applicable to both GSM and LTE, and supported by Evolved Packet Core (EPC). It enables extended battery life of communication modules such as sensors by up to 10 years thanks to optimized, power-efficient operations.

"IoT is a key area in Orange's Essentials2020 strategic plan, and France should play a key role in IoT takeoff in Europe. In order to extend our connectivity offer, we are currently deploying a LoRa network. At the same time, we are preparing the future of cellular networks and we are happy to collaborate with Ericsson to be the first operator to demonstrate IoT over GSM and LTE in order to roll it out ahead of 5G availability in the market."

The demonstration, which took place at the Infocom World 2015 event in Athens on November 24, 2015, used Ericsson’s radio solutions and Ericsson Networks Software 16A . In addition, three component 20+20+10MHz FDD LTE carrier aggregation in combination with 256 QAM modulation deployed in a live network for the first time in the European market.

Ericsson said its 256QAM downlink encoding technology provides up to 33 percent higher downlink throughput in good radio conditions. This enables more efficient use of the spectrum allocated to a cell, as well as a 33 percent increase in maximum user downlink throughput.

"OTE Group brings the future of telecommunications today. We invest in innovation in order to be the first to offer our customers pioneering fixed and mobile telecommunications services, while we continue to assertively expand our New Generation Networks and develop the country’s infrastructure. With the consecutive 'firsts' achieved by the OTE Group, such as the demonstration of speeds up to 500 Mbps via our 4G+ network, we confirm our technological superiority and make a difference for our customers," stated Stefanos Theocharopoulos, Chief Technology & Operations Officer, OTE Group.

NTT DOCOMO announced results from several recent 5G trials, each of which surpassed the gigabit barrier. Some highlights:

A 5G trial it conducted with Nokia Networks at the Roppongi Hills high-rise complex in Tokyo on October 13 achieved data transmission in excess of 2Gbps. The trial used millimeter-wavelength signals with an extremely high frequency of 70GHz, a key development for the eventual commercial use of 5G wireless technology in actual-use environments. To date, no test had achieved a 5G data transmission in a commercial complex, such as a shopping mall, due to problems with base stations being out of line of sight and diffused reflections causing the attenuation of highly directional millimeter signals. This time, however, the trial was successful thanks to the use of two new technologies: beamforming, which focuses radio waves in a specific direction, and beam tracking to control beam direction according to the mobile device's location.

A 5G trial with Samsung Electronics in Suwon-city, South Korea on November 12 achieved a maximum data-receiving speed of more than 2.5Gbps. This was accomplished in a vehicle travelling with a speed of 60km/h. The trial used a 28GHz high-frequency signal in combination with beamforming with a high number of antenna elements and beam tracking.

A 5G trial with Ericsson verified the feasibility of massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) technology by achieving a real-time data-receiving speed of more than 10Gbps using Ericsson 5G radio prototypes with a 15GHz frequency band on November 19.

A 5G trial with Fujitsu confirmed a multi-base-station cooperative transmission system by achieving a data-receiving speed of over 11Gbps in total of four mobile devices with a 4.6GHz signal on October 26.

A 5G outdoor data transmission trial conducted by DOCOMO, DOCOMO Beijing Communications Laboratories and Huawei Technologies on November 18 achieved a multi-user MIMO (MU-MIMO) transmission of 43.9bps/Hz/cell, which was 3.6-times more efficient than past outdoor trials of LTE-Advanced based MU-MIMO technology.

ADVA said this team of engineers is specifically focused on the development of optical monitoring technology and will help to advance its FSP 3000 Access Link Monitoring (ALM) product.

"We have one of the biggest engineering teams in the industry. It's this combined intelligence, this collective insight, that sets us apart," said Christoph Glingener, CTO, ADVA Optical Networking. "That's why this acquisition is so important. We're adding dynamic new talent to our engineering force. Our new team members will help us to further strengthen our layer 1 assurance strategy. In a world driven by cloud and mobility, service delivery and assurance are critical factors that can effectively decide the success or failure of cloud offerings. That's why our team will be working hard to explore new possibilities and rapidly implement new features. Make no mistake, in 2016, our FSP 3000 ALM will be a product to watch. I can't wait to see what our new team achieves."

In December 2014, ADVA Optical Networking introduced its new FSP 3000 Access Link Monitoring (ALM) solution for providing greater insights into carrier fiber access networks.The ADVA FSP 3000 ALM is a small, non-intrusive device that operates independently of data networking equipment and regardless of the bitrate and protocol the overlaying service is using. It provides visibility into the health of fiber links by analyzing reflections of a non-intrusive test signal in continuous real-time. It can simultaneously monitor up to 16 fiber access tails and supports distances of 30km.

Verizon reported a bounce in broadband and mobile data traffic for Black Friday:

Broadband traffic attributed to e-commerce shopping activities on Black Friday (Nov. 27) spiked by 12 percentage points from Thanksgiving Day, and is relatively consistent with the same day in 2014.

Average daily mobile traffic on Black Friday increased by a few percentage points from Thanksgiving Day, which exhibited the same pattern in 2014.

Year-over-year, average daily traffic for both e-commerce and mobile commerce on Black Friday remained relatively consistent.

Internet traffic attributed to online shopping activities on the Wednesday (Nov. 25) before Thanksgiving increased by three points (105) from the same day in 2014, though declined a few points by Thanksgiving Day.

Average daily mobile traffic spiked (109 points) on the Wednesday (Nov. 25) before Thanksgiving though was slightly down from the same day in 2014.

Year-over-year, average daily traffic for both wireline and mobile remained relatively consistent, though overall numbers were higher for this same period last year.

"The kickoff weekend to the holiday season is no longer about shopping via a specific channel—whether mobile, online or in-store—on a given date. It’s the Wild West for retailers as they continue to try new tactics to attract consumers and gain wallet share. The challenge will be in successfully engaging with customers throughout the season who may be holding out for better deals given all the price slashing and special offers," stated Michele Dupré, group vice president of retail, hospitality and distribution for Verizon Enterprise Solutions.

India is on track to surpass half a billion mobile subscribers by the end of the year, according to a new GSMA study published today, signaling the start of a new era for the country’s mobile economy. The new report, ‘The Mobile Economy: India 2015’, finds that 13 per cent of the world’s mobile subscribers reside in India and that subscriber growth is forecast to outperform the regional and global averages over the coming years as the country cements its position as the world’s second-largest mobile market behind China.

Some highlights:

India had 453 million unique mobile subscribers at the end of 2014.

India is forecast to add a further 250 million subscribers by 2020 to reach 734 million, accounting for almost half of all the subscriber growth expected in the Asia Pacific region over this period.

Frowth is linked to India’s relatively low mobile subscriber penetration rate, which stood at 36 per cent of the population at the end of 2014, compared to a 50 percent global average.

The subscriber penetration rate in India is forecast to reach 54 per cent by 2020 as many millions more are connected by mobile.

Mobile broadband networks (3G/4G) accounted for only 11 per cent of Indian mobile connections in 2014, but are expected to make up 42 percent of the total by 2020.

More than half a billion new smartphones connections are expected in India between 2015 and 2020, bringing the total to 690 million, up from 149 million in 2014.

India’s mobile industry made a total contribution of INR7.7 lakh crore (US$116 billion) to the Indian economy in 2014, equivalent to 6.1 per cent of India’s total GDP. This contribution is forecast to almost double to INR14 lakh crore by 2020, which would represent 8.2 per cent of projected GDP by that point.

“India is a unique mobile market and one where the mobile ecosystem is playing a hugely influential role in transforming the lives of its citizens, and driving economic growth,” said Alex Sinclair, Acting Director General and Chief Technology Officer at the GSMA. “The market is now rapidly migrating to mobile broadband technology, which is providing a platform for India to transform into a digitally empowered society and connect many millions of unconnected citizens to the internet over the coming years.”

Polkomtel, the Polish operator of the Plus network, has partnered with Nokia Networks to launch Poland’s first public trial of its Wi-Fi Calling+ service. The service lets users make regular calls when connected by Wi-Fi in locations with poor mobile coverage. The common voice core for VoWiFi and voice over LTE (VoLTE) enables a smooth evolution of enhanced voice services going forward.

During the trial period, the Wi-Fi Calling+ service is available to Plus users in Poland and across the European Union. Polkomtel is testing the functionality before its commercial launch, gathering feedback and ensuring its flawless integration and operation in the Plus network.

The service uses Nokia’s voice core technology, including its IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS), Open TAS (Telecommunications Application Server) and Border Gateway (BGW), along with a fully customized end-user application from OptiMobile.

Friday, November 27, 2015

The World Radiocommunication Conference 2015 in Switzerland agreed on a framework for future access to satellite spectrum.

“WRC-15 has been a turning point in the global recognition of the value of satellite services for the future. We commend the national administrations – and the WRC Chairman, Mr. Festus Daudu – for their commitment to connectivity for all,” said a joint statement of a coalition of associations representing the satellite industry. “These decisions provide the stability necessary for the entire satellite industry to fully leverage its strengths in support of the vision expressed by the WRC delegates.”

Highlights:

L-band: WRC-15 avoided identification of the L-band spectrum, which is used by mobile satellite service operators around the world, for IMT. The Conference identified the band 1427-1518 MHz for IMT, requesting the ITU-R to determine the technical measures to ensure compatibility with the mobile-satellite service operations in the adjacent band (1518-1559 MHz).

C-band: WRC-15 reconfirmed the need to protect critical fixed-satellite service (FSS) services throughout the world in this unique band. The lower 200 MHz of the C-band downlink frequencies (3400-3600 MHz) were identified for IMT in ITU Regions 1 and 2; In Region 3 a handful of countries will sign a footnote allowing potential IMT use of these 200 MHz, while the vast majority of the region will continue satellite use of this band with no change. A position of “No Change” was adopted in the band 3600-4200 MHz, and only in Region 2 was a footnote agreed which identified IMT for a few countries in the 3600-3700 MHz band. A “No Change” decision means that administrations have recognised the vital and widespread use of those frequency bands by satellite services. Anywhere that IMT is deployed, it will be subject to adherence to strict protection requirements with neighbouring countries. In addition, the Conference declined to consider a proposal for IMT systems in the C-band uplink frequencies (5925-6425 MHz).

Ku-band: In order to address a spectrum imbalance in Ku-band spectrum, WRC-15 identified additional spectrum for FSS systems between 10-17 GHz. A downlink allocation in the 13.4-13.65 GHz band in Region 1 (EMEA) was approved by the Conference. In addition, an allocation in the 14.5-14.8 GHz was approved in several countries around the world.

Future bands for 5G: The Conference decided that no globally harmonised bands for the fixed satellite service, mobile-satellite service and broadcast-satellite service in C, Ku or Ka band would be included in the scope of a new WRC-19 agenda item, which aims to identify new frequency bands for future IMT/ 5G use. Throughout the deliberations, multiple administrations in every world region expressed strong opposition to studying the Ka band for IMT/5G, again confirming the Conference’s confidence in satellite being a key player in the future digital eco-system.

ESIMs: The Conference adopted new regulations to facilitate the operation of “Earth Stations in Motion” (ESIMs) in part of the Ka-band satellite spectrum (19.7-20.2 GHz and 29.5-30 GHz). ESIMs operating in this band provide satellite broadband connectivity to mobile terminals, such as on ships and aircraft. The new regulations adopted by WRC-15 will facilitate the global roaming of such terminals, while protecting other services and applications from interference.

Other: WRC-15 adopted several agenda items for future conferences that will spur growth in the satellite industry. Studies were approved for WRC-19 for additional FSS spectrum in 51.4-52.4 GHz. In addition, the conference adopted a future agenda item for WRC-23 for additional satellite spectrum in the 37.5-39.5 GHz. Also, in a hotly contested debate, the Conference adopted a Resolution which sets the path towards allowing the use of FSS links for Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS).

Ericsson opened at 5G "Garage" within its R&D facility in Budapest, Hungary to served as an incubator for the 5G ecosystem.

5G for Hungary is part of the recently launched "5G for Europe" program, which will deliver industry pilots of 5G solutions in areas including the Internet of Things, energy and utilities, safety and security, public infrastructure and retail. It will include joint innovation and prototyping as well as demos to operators and enterprises.

Ericsson said these initiatives also support the recently launched “5G Exchange” (5GEx) collaborative innovation project co-funded by the European Commission and that is driven by the Ericsson Research team in Budapest.

Ericsson is expanding its cross-industry 5G research and development (R&D) program in Europe, aiming to bring together major industrial players, the public sector and leading universities across Europe to strengthen the continent's competitiveness and maximize the benefits of the Networked Society.

The 5G for Europe program will focus on delivering research, innovation and industrial pilots that use next-generation 5G networks as an enabler. One of the goals is to deliver industry pilots of possible 5G solutions in areas including transport and automotive, the Internet of Things, utilities, public safety, public infrastructure and retail.

The program's academic and research partners include major technical universities such as Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna, Pisa, Italy, Technische Universität Dresden, Germany, Universidad Carlos III of Madrid, Spain, IMDEA Networks Institute, Madrid, Spain, and King's College, London, United Kingdom. Among the industry partners are leading enterprises such as wiseSense, Weiss Robotics and MyOmega System Technology in Germany and Zucchetti Centro Sistemi in Italy.

Ulf Ewaldsson, Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer, Ericsson, says: "5G is the next step in the evolution of mobile communication and will be a fundamental enabler of the Networked Society. However, Ericsson needs to work together with industries to understand their specific network requirements in order to realize the full benefits of 5G technologies. "By expanding our 5G program to include major partners across Europe, we will gain valuable insights that will enable industries to digitalize effectively, to create new value and to strengthen the competitive position of European industry."

Tuesday, November 24, 2015

A recent survey on the future of network appliances indicates that 100G will be the dominant speed rate in core, metro and access in 2018. How can we ensure that NFV is ready for this challenge?

Great strides have been made over the last three years in proving the viability of Network Functions Virtualization (NFV). Dozens of Proof of Concept (PoC) trials have proven that workloads can be migrated to virtual environments running on standard hardware, and there are even examples of carrier deployments using NFV. This is all thanks to the work of visionary carriers and vendors who recognize the need for a drastic change in how carriers do business if they are to survive and thrive in the future.

Thanks to this effort, the issue is no longer whether NFV will work; the issue is how we can make NFV work effectively so it will deliver on its promise. The issue is no longer whether a service can be deployed using NFV, but whether we can manage and secure that service in an NFV environment. In other words, the challenge now is to operationalize NFV.

Managing and securing services requires network appliances that can monitor and analyze network behavior. A recent survey by Heavy Reading on behalf of Napatech provides insight into how network appliances are being used today, progress on migrating network appliances to virtual environments and insight into the challenges that need to be addressed to ensure the success of this migration.

In “The Future of Network Appliances,” 47 percent of respondents considered network appliances for network management and security as essential, while a further 39 percent considered them valuable, reflecting a broad appreciation for the operational value of appliances. Survey responses also show that network management and security appliances are broadly deployed, especially for applications like network and application performance monitoring, test and measurement as well as firewalls, intrusion detection and prevention, and data loss prevention.

Nevertheless, the survey also showed progress in migrating network appliances to virtual environments, especially for the most widely deployed applications. 73 percent of carriers indicated that they intend to deploy virtualized appliances over the next two years. Network equipment vendors are responding, with 71 percent indicating that they intend to deliver virtualized appliances in the same time frame.

The top three challenges that respondents could see in delivering and deploying virtualized appliances were interworking with other vendor solutions (81 percent concerned or extremely concerned), security (79 percent) and throughput (80 percent).

But the most eye-opening challenge that the survey highlighted must be the extensive deployment of 100G network data rates in not just the core but also the metro and, most surprisingly of all, the access network. Survey respondents were asked to indicate the most common planned data rate for the core, metro and access networks in 2018. The responses showed that 75 percent of respondents planned for 100G as their most common data rate in the core and 71 percent planned to use 100G in the metro, while 58 percent planned to use 100G in the access network.

This will potentially prove to be the greatest challenge in virtualizing network appliances over the next three years. The first 100G physical network appliances are just now being introduced to the market. They are based on standard servers, as the majority of physical network appliances are today. However, they rely on high-performance network interface cards capable of providing the throughput required at these data rates.

Standard Network Interface Cards (NICs) cannot provide the performance required for these kinds of applications even at data rates of 10G. Recent benchmark testing of NFV solutions which are based on standard NICs have shown that there are serious performance challenges in using these kinds of products for high-speed applications even when using Data Plane Development Kit (DPDK) acceleration. Solutions based on bypassing hypervisors, such as Single-Root Input/Output Virtualization (SR-IOV), provide some relief, but come at the expense of virtual function mobility and flexibility.

Network management and security solutions are essential to the successful operation of virtualized networks and will need to be able to operate at 100G data rates within the next three years. One should therefore expect a reassessment of the need for alternative NIC solutions in NFV deployments. These need not be focused solely on network management and security virtualized applications, as the performance issues faced by these applications are similar to those that will be faced by other virtual appliances at high data rates. This technical challenge has already been solved in the physical world. Now it is merely a question of migrating these solutions to the virtualized environment to make sure that NFV is not only deployable but also operational, even at speeds of 100G.

About the Author

Daniel Joseph Barry is VP Positioning and Chief Evangelist at Napatech and has over 20 years experience in the IT and Telecom industry. Prior to joining Napatech in 2009, Dan Joe was Marketing Director at TPACK, a leading supplier of transport chip solutions to the Telecom sector. From 2001 to 2005, he was Director of Sales and Business Development at optical component vendor NKT Integration (now Ignis Photonyx) following various positions in product development, business development and product management at Ericsson. Dan Joe joined Ericsson in 1995 from a position in the R&D department of Jutland Telecom (now TDC). He has an MBA and a BSc degree in Electronic Engineering from Trinity College Dublin.

Nokia Networks, Deutsche Telekom and Cosmote (Deutsche Telekom’s subsidiary in Greece and leading network operator in the country) have demonstrated a world-first: LTE-Advanced 3 carrier aggregation combining LTE-FDD in band 3 (1.8 GHz) with LTE-TDD in band 42 (3.5 GHz). The showcase, completed with the commercially available Nokia Flexi Multiradio 10 Base Station, confirms the ability of 3.5 GHz LTE-TDD technology to increase mobile broadband capacity and improve the consumer experience.

The demonstration used the Nokia Single RAN Advanced platform, including the Nokia Flexi Multiradio 10 Base Station for both LTE-FDD and -TDD technologies, with its high-capacity TD-LTE-Advanced 8-pipe radio.

“Deutsche Telekom is a real innovation leader. Hand in hand with our NatCos we are shaping the local markets, especially in LTE. Spectrum plays a fundamental role for mobile communications as we look to exploit opportunities to meet the growing demand for network capacity. The demonstration of FDD-TDD 3 carrier aggregation together with our partners, sets a benchmark for a completely new combination of technologies including the increasingly recognized band 42 which will be expected to be a mainstream TDD band," Rachid El Hattachi, SVP Technology Architecture & Blueprints, Deutsche Telekom.

Microsemi Corporation and PMC-Sierra entered into a definitive agreement under which Microsemi will acquire PMC for $9.22 in cash and 0.0771 of a share of Microsemi common stock for each share of PMC common stock through an exchange offer. The transaction is valued at approximately $2.5 billion and represents a 77.4 percent percent premium to the closing price of PMC's stock as of Sept. 30, 2015.

"We are pleased PMC has accepted our compelling strategic offer, which clearly benefits shareholders of both Microsemi and PMC. We can now shift our focus to realizing the significant synergies identified during our comprehensive analysis," said James J. Peterson, Microsemi's chairman and CEO. "As we have previously stated, this acquisition will provide Microsemi with a leading position in high performance and scalable storage solutions, while also adding a complementary portfolio of high-value communications products."

The transaction is expected to be immediately accretive to Microsemi's non-GAAP EPS and free cash flow. Microsemi anticipates achieving more than $100 million in annual cost synergies with greater than $75 million of those expected to be realized in the first full quarter of combined operations. Microsemi currently estimates approximately $0.60 of non-GAAP EPS accretion in the first full year after closing the transaction.

Terms of the agreement were approved by the boards of directors of both Microsemi and PMC.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise reported fiscal 2015 fourth quarter revenue of $14.1 billion, down 4% year over year, or up 3% in constant currency. This is the second consecutive quarter of year over year, constant currency revenue growth for the Hewlett Packard Enterprise segments.

Business segment results are as follows:

Enterprise Group revenue was $7.4 billion, up 2% year over year, up 9% in constant currency, with a 14.0% operating margin. Industry Standard Servers revenue was up 5%, up 13% in constant currency, Storage revenue was down 7%, flat in constant currency, Business Critical Systems revenue was down 8%, down 2% in constant currency, Networking revenue was up 35%, up 43% in constant currency, and Technology Services revenue was down 11%, down 4% in constant currency.

Enterprise Services revenue was $5.0 billion, down 9% year over year, down 2% in constant currency, with an 8.2% operating margin. Infrastructure Technology Outsourcing revenue was down 11%, down 4% in constant currency, and Application and Business Services revenue was down 5%, up 1% in constant currency.

Software revenue was $958 million, down 7% year over year, down 2% in constant currency, with a 30.1% operating margin. License revenue was down 6%, down 2% in constant currency, support revenue was down 9%, down 4% in constant currency, professional services revenue was down 3%, up 4% in constant currency, and software-as-a-service (SaaS) revenue was down 2%, down 2% in constant currency.

HP Financial Services revenue was $802 million, down 11% year over year, down 4% in constant currency with a 2% increase in net portfolio assets and a 4% decrease in financing volume. The business delivered an operating margin of 10.8%.

"Hewlett Packard Enterprise is off to a very strong start," said Meg Whitman, president and chief executive officer, Hewlett Packard Enterprise. "The new company's business segments delivered a second consecutive quarter of constant currency revenue growth in Q4, and we believe that momentum will accelerate into FY16."

Macquarie Telecom, Australia’s leading managed hosting and business-only telecommunications company, has deployed the MapR data platform to help secure the communications of the Australian government.

Macquarie Telecom’s Government Division today secures telecommunications for 42% of government agencies in Australia. The company provides government employees with a secure Internet gateway, so they can safely access external public websites, downloads, and email services.

“With the growing complexity of the digital threat landscape and the development of SaaS and cloud services, Macquarie Telecom must secure and analyze an exponentially growing amount of data, as well as predict increasingly sophisticated cyber-attacks,” commented Aidan Tudehope, managing director of Macquarie Hosting Group at Macquarie Telecom. “Big data analytics in a hybrid cloud services model is the next big thing in complex security environments such as those of governments. We needed a comprehensive platform that is able to analyze data in the cloud and most importantly in real-time, which is what MapR is providing us with today. We considered several distributions of Hadoop, and chose the MapR Distribution as best for our needs.”

Monday, November 23, 2015

There’s a lot of talk about OpenFlow as an evolving architecture for driving software-defined networking (SDN), but so far much of the action has been around development rather than deployments, and most of the deployment activity has been in the data center. In this article, we’ll look at some real-world examples of OpenFlow and SDN in action in the larger network.

Disaggregating the Network

Implementing open networking solutions is a matter of disaggregating the network. Historically, networking has been done through a series of vertically integrated systems. Major networking equipment vendors sell tightly integrated switches, routers, and line cards, and provisioning the network means manually configuring each network element.

In OpenFlow-driven SDN, the model is to disaggregate, to use standardized building blocks to create solutions. End users and subscribers want to change applications, raise or lower bandwidth limits, or choose the speed of their connections, and manually configured networks simply can’t respond quickly enough. OpenFlow-based SDN delivers policy-driven networks where network settings are reconfigured on the fly via the OpenFlow controller, and OpenFlow is the common control protocol between all of the disaggregated parts (network operating system, or NOS, controller, and applications).

Meter, match, and act are the three steps SDN undertakes to execute tasks in a policy- driven network. SDN enables the metering of traffic conditions, application and user behavior to match those conditions against a set of pre-defined criteria and then to act on the match according to a policy. Part of a policy framework is to pre-set conditions that are metered against. So, for example, if a customer uses a home interface to ratchet up bandwidth, the OpenFlow controller receives this input and automatically delivers more bandwidth to that subscriber. If a network must scale to support more users, the OpenFlow controller can add routes, VLANs, and flows through the network switches.

In a way, disaggregating the network is tearing it down in order to build it up again in a more useful, flexible, and dynamic way. Now, let’s look at OpenFlow and SDN applications in action.

A Subscriber Control Panel

An Asia-Pacific service provider offers its subscribers a choice of price, performance (bandwidth, latency, and throughput), and security settings. To scale this offering, the provider needed to automate the process so that network throughput, for example, could be changed remotely and quickly through a subscriber action.

Specifically, the service provider wanted to enable:

Liquid bandwidth – allowing subscribers to dynamically change the speed of their connections

Metered access – implementing an AWS-like, usage-based billing model

QoS on Demand – enabling the network to dynamically select the QoS level based on the usage model or application.

SDN enables these services because traffic engineering is based on policies derived from inputs to the customer portal. A graphical slider like the one in Figure 1 drives requests to the OpenFlow controller. Moreover, SDN enables seamless public and private cloud-bursting and migration, turning up more capacity automatically as needed.

Figure 1: A self-service control panel allows customers to dial up bandwidth from home or office.

The critical customer requirements for this use case were a combination of OpenFlow and legacy protocol support. Specifically the customer wanted integration between MPLS and hardware-based OpenFlow. The rationale followed what Google published in January 2011. Specifically, OpenFlow reprograms MPLS labels as a result of a policy, triggering the need to change a path for a giving traffic flow. The policy would be governed by the slider input from the control panel. From a traffic engineering perspective, paths would be chosen to ensure the path selected delivered the expected SLA.

The customer had also tracked OpenDaylight (ODL) development and felt that it was the best controller for their needs. Pica8 was the best choice for this SDN project since the Pica8 NOS, PicOS, supports OpenFlow 1.4, is integrated with ODL, and has support for MPLS.

Turning Up Bandwidth to Rural Subscribers

Renewed popularity of fiber to the premises (FTTP) for homes and small businesses is enabling municipalities and regional governments to reduce the “digital divide” and provide high-speed content and services to rural areas. Customers want to apply the “App Store” model at home for selecting content and bandwidth services, but bandwidth requirements and capabilities vary widely across the region.

Rather than manually provisioning VPNs to customer premise equipment (CPE), this regional service provider used OpenFlow to set up virtual CPE (vCPE) that can dynamically adjust bandwidth and services under user control. Two other services users desired were on-demand disaster recovery (disaster recovery as a service, or DRaaS) and hybrid cloud services for small businesses.

In this case, the vCPE can offer advanced firewall services in addition to dynamic VPNs offering DRaaS. Scalable liquid bandwidth is guaranteed as part of an SDN access network.

For this SDN deployment, the customer was keen to offer “smart city” services by leveraging existing infrastructure to minimize CapEx of new SDN services. At a fundamental level, service redundancy was desired to ensure Telco-like resiliency, thus redundant hardware was used throughout the topology. Hardware-based OpenFlow, driven again by ODL, was selected based on the customer’s involvement with this community.

Lastly, PicOS was chosen as it supports a rich set of Layer-2 and routing features including OSPF and BGP. This support ensured integration of the service edge based on white box switches with upstream Cisco and Juniper aggregation and core devices. The integrator for these smart cities additionally leveraged virtual CPEs (vCPEs) on hardened services to deliver high touch services on top of the liquid bandwidth services.

Maintaining Competitive Video Service

A North American satellite broadcast media provider faced increasing competition from over-the-top (OTT) providers and other cable and satellite broadcasters, and wanted to improve the speed, ease, and quality with which its services could be delivered. Customers were demanding an app-store, point-and-click content selection model, but a manually provisioned network couldn’t deliver this functionality. Self-provisioned networks would meet the demand, and they would also reduce the need for truck rolls and significantly lessen churn caused by long waits for new services or upgrades.

The solution was to implement self-service provisioning with point-and-click content selection via OpenFlow. The tight integration of OpenFlow and the current multicast environment drives rapid ROI and ensures smooth integration.

In this last deployment scenario, the customer was particularly interested in leveraging hardware-based OpenFlow in conjunction with the ONOS controller from ON.Labs, now governed by the Linux Foundation. As with the other two examples, integrating the new SDN functionality with legacy protocols was key. Here, since this is a media / video streaming application, multicast support was mandatory and PicOS has a suite of multicast support protocols, including IGMPv3, PIM-SM and PIM-SSM.

As we have seen, OpenFlow-based SDN applications are increasingly driving customer satisfaction and service provider revenues in the market today. Networks are becoming more flexible in an era of on-demand computing, bandwidth, and services; and megatrends like mobile usage, Big Data, and the Internet of Things will continue to drive a need for network scale and agility. By breaking monolithic networks apart and building solutions with OpenFlow and SDN, network operators can be ready for the future.

About the Author

Calvin Chai is the Head of Product Marketing for Pica8 Inc. Prior to Pica8, Calvin has held numerous leadership roles in product, technical, solution, and corporate marketing. Most recently, he led the cloud product marketing team at Juniper Networks where he was responsible for the marketing strategy focused on the cloud and data center markets. Prior to Juniper, Calvin spent ten years at Cisco focused on various technology initiatives including integrated security, policy, and identity management solutions.

Calvin holds a BS degree in Computer Science and Engineering from the University of California at Berkeley.

Zayo Group Holdings agreed to acquire Allstream,a wholly owned subsidiary of MTS, for CAD $465 million, representing a pre-synergized adjusted EBITDA multiple of less than five times. Allstream has approximately CAD $600M revenue and Adjusted EBITDA (excluding restructuring charges) of approximately CAD $100M.

Allstream is a Canadian leader in IP communications and the only national provider that works exclusively with business customers. Zayo said the acquisition will add substantial fiber and colocation assets across Canada to its own core network Communications Infrastructure business. Allstream has over 9,000 route kilometers of metro fiber network concentrated in Canada’s top five metropolitan markets, (Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Ottawa, and Calgary) that connect to approximately 3,300 on-net buildings. In addition, Allstream has an approximate 20,000 route kilometer long-haul fiber network connecting all major Canadian markets and 10 U.S. network access points. In addition, Allstream operates colocation space in Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver.

“Within today’s Allstream is a robust collection of fiber networks, which are enormously valuable to both Allstream and Zayo customers,” explained Dan Caruso, chairman and CEO of Zayo. “We will unleash the full potential of these assets by combining them with Zayo’s network and focus on providing high-quality and low-cost bandwidth to help fuel the growth of Canada’s economy.”

Zayo estimates that approximately half of Allstream’s revenue is a direct fit with Zayo’s existing core business. Zayo’s investment thesis is to separate this business from other parts of Allstream, and integrate it into Zayo, using the same approach as is currently in place for Zayo UK and Zayo France. This plan includes retaining a strong Canadian brand and presence. The segmentation of the Communication Infrastructure portion of Allstream’s business (“Zayo Canada”) and follow-on reporting into Zayo’s core business segments (Dark Fiber Solutions, Colocation & Cloud Infrastructure, and Network Connectivity) will take multiple quarters to complete.

“As we stand up Zayo Canada, we are targeting CAD $300M of revenue, a >40 percent EBITDA margin, and a high single digit growth rate,” said Karl Maier, president of Zayo International. “If we achieve this outcome and apply an EBITDA multiple similar to Zayo, the value of Zayo Canada will be substantial.”

The other half of Allstream’s business will be organized into two additional segments: Voice and Universal Communications (approximately one third of Allstream’s revenue), and Small Business (primarily enterprise voice). Each of these will be separated into standalone business units in parallel with the formation of Zayo Canada.

MTS is Manitoba’s leading communications company and is wholly owned by Manitoba Telecom Services Inc. (TSX: MBT).

Equinix announced availability of Amazon Web Services (AWS) Direct Connect in its Dallas and London International Business Exchange (IBX) data centers (DA2 and LD5).

AWS Direct Connect availability in London marks the second Equinix location in Europe to offer the service. This deployment allows Equinix to improve upon previous connectivity options by offering “native” AWS Direct Connect service to customers into the full portfolio of AWS Cloud offerings. Previously, connectivity in London was available via tether from Equinix in London into AWS’s Dublin facilities. In October 2014, Equinix announced availability of AWS Direct Connect in the company’s Frankfurt data center.

China Telecom is deploying Alcatel-Lucent's IP routing technology, including the 7950 XRS IP Core Router and 7750 Service Router, to expand its 4G LTE network. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Alcatel-Lucent said its 7950 XRS, which is already in use in Jiangsu province and Shanghai, will manage the increasing traffic in the urban data centers of Beijing as the financial hub of Guangzhou. Alcatel-Lucent’s 7750 Service Router will be deployed across seven major provinces.

All deployments will be completed in preparation for service in China Telecom’s network in December.

Alcatel-Lucent is also providing 15 percent of China Telecom’s new-build edge routing capabilities under this contract, including the deployment of its 7750 SR portfolio across seven major provinces to aggregate traffic at the metro network edge.

Alcatel-Lucent now providing 25 percent of China Telecom’s new build core routing network capabilities under this contract, including support for all data center interconnections in Beijing and Guangzhou.

Spirent Communications unveiled an operator analytics solution that focuses on customer experience assurance and troubleshooting, with support for 2/3/4G technologies including VoLTE and the Internet of Things (IoT).

Spirent's InTouch Customer and Network Analytics (CNA) enables mobile operators’ engineering, customer care, and marketing groups to proactively identify and resolve wireless customer experience issues spanning LTE/4G networks and services like VoLTE. The solution is an evolution of the company's field-tested InTouch platform, which has been deployed in networks exceeding 100 million subscribers.

“Our solution is unique in that it allows operators to build and leverage quality of experience (QoE) scores using data mining techniques, which can prevent churn,” said Frank Galuppo, general manager of Spirent’s CEM business unit. “This allows them to rapidly identify and resolve issues before customers complain or leave.”

Several operators are already deploying beta versions of InTouch CNA, especially for new services like VoLTE and IoT.

The Broadband Forum completed work on the management of Fiber to the Distribution Point (FTTdp), which aids in the management of fiber-fed nodes in the periphery of the access network.

At the Broadband Forum’s quarterly meeting in Mexico, it was agreed that the FTTdp YANG management model was ready for release exclusively to members for testing in network equipment. This is the Forum’s first software project written in the YANG modelling language.

“This is great news for our members whether they be service providers, vendors or test houses,” said Broadband Forum CEO Robin Mersh. “By adopting YANG modelling we are in the process of moving the management of FTTdp from the drawing board into the network, helping to drive open interoperability between different devices. This means service providers can offer competitive ultrafast services such as G.fast.”

Regarding G.fast, the Forum approved the University of New Hampshire Interoperability Labs (UNH-IOL) as a test facility for the latest G.fast plug-fest – paving the way to the industry’s first certifications.

“The success of the Forum in accelerating broadband innovation would not be possible if it weren’t for the expertise and energy of its members,” said Kevin Foster, Chairman of the Broadband Forum. “When the Broadband Forum started there were less than a million broadband connections and now there are more than 750 million. This is an extraordinary achievement and one that would not be possible without the hard work and commitment of our members, like Les, on our various projects.”

Infinera and EBlink, a supplier of of wireless fronthaul technology, announced a partnership to deliver both fiber and wireless based solutions and to provide an end-to-end fronthaul architecture.

The joint solution has already been demonstrated in a live field trial with Orange in western France that interconnected baseband units (BBU) and remote radio heads (RRH) from several of Orange's Radio Access Network (RAN) vendors. In the live field trial, the combined Infinera TM-Series and EBlink FrontLink solution demonstrated on Orange's network how it can deliver a unique end-to-end performance combining fiber and wireless for mobile fronthaul.

Where fiber exists, the Infinera TM-Series delivers bandwidth using WDM. Where there is no fiber, EBlink's wireless fronthaul is complementary to the WDM fronthaul solution.

"Mobile fronthaul is a challenging environment with tough requirements on latency and synchronisation for optical solutions," said Sten Nordell, CTO of Infinera's Metro Business Group. "As one of the few suppliers capable of achieving these requirements, we are very pleased to partner with EBlink and Orange to demonstrate that the combination of fiber and wireless is the right alchemy for mobile fronthaul."

"This partnership with Infinera reaffirms the relevance of our wireless fronthaul technologies and how complementary fiber and wireless can be," said Eric Sèle, deputy CEO of EBlink. "The deployment of the Infinera and EBlink solutions on Orange's network underscores the concept that wireless fronthaul picks up where fiber leaves off."

Brocade reported fourth quarter revenue of $589 million, an increase of 4% year-over-year and 7% quarter-over-quarter. Revenue for fiscal year 2015 was $2,263 million, up 2% year-over-year. The resulting GAAP diluted earnings per share (EPS) was $0.20 for the fourth quarter and $0.79 for fiscal year 2015, up 6% and up 48% year-over-year, respectively.

"Fiscal 2015 was a productive year in which we achieved many significant milestones," said Lloyd Carney, CEO of Brocade. "We delivered annual revenue growth in fiscal 2015, with a year-over-year revenue increase in each fiscal quarter. We grew our non-GAAP EPS by 12% for the fiscal year, delivering more than a dollar per share for the first time. We continued to expand our portfolio of software and hardware products through both technology innovation and strategic acquisitions. Looking forward, these investments create new opportunities for us to continue to grow revenue and EPS in 2016 and beyond."

SAN product revenue for Q4 was $325 million, flat year-over-year and up 5% quarter-over-quarter. The Q4 year-over-year product revenue performance reflects a 14% increase in director sales and a 1% increase in embedded switch sales, offset by a 12% decrease in switch sales. For fiscal year 2015, SAN product revenue was $1,301 million, down 2% year-over-year, primarily due to lower switch and embedded switch sales, partially offset by higher director sales.

IP Networking product revenue for Q4 was $170 million, up 12% year-over-year and 10% quarter-over-quarter. The Q4 year-over-year increase was primarily driven by a 28% increase in Ethernet switch sales and improved software sales, partially offset by a 20% decline in router revenue. For fiscal year 2015, IP Networking product revenue was $601 million, up 14% year-over-year due to stronger switch, router, and software sales.

Sunday, November 22, 2015

The outlook for Carrier Ethernet is very robust, according leading U.S. service providers at last week's GEN15 event in Dallas. Vertical Systems Group is forecasting that by 2020 there will be over four million ports installed worldwide, of which approximately 1.3 million ports are expected to be in the U.S. This build-out of Carrier Ethernet infrastructure is further expected to become the platform NFV-driven advanced services. The GEN15 event focused onenabling the future of agile, assured, and orchestrated services that are powered by CE 2.0, LSO (Lifecycle Service Orchestration), SDN, and NFV.
In a keynote at GEN15, Josh Goodell, VP of AT&T's Network on Demand, said its platform is already in 170 markets across of the country. Ethernet on Demand is the first service, to be followed shortly by a Managed Internet on Demand service.

Some notes from GEN15:

The MEF continues to focus on Carrier Ethernet 2.0

MEF reports growing intereset in its Lifecycle Service Orchestration (LSO) initiative. Work on LSO has shifted from high-level architecture to developing API components.

Industry collaboration toward the globalization of CE 2.0 and the MEF's Third Network vision is growing

PCCW Global has selected CENX’s Cortx Service Orchestrator to enhance elements in its VPN and cloud offerings that will facilitate self-serve, on-demand connectivity. Using an on-line portal, integrated to PCCW Global’s OSS and BSS environments, customers can dynamically scale their bandwidth connectivity and cloud data center resources.

Wedge Networks, which supplies orchestrated threat management solutions, named James Hamilton as its new CEO. Hamilton previously was CEO of TippingPoint, the company that defined Intrusion Prevention Systems (IPS) and that was acquired for $430 million by 3Com, where he stayed on and continued to lead the TippingPoint line of business.

Cylance, a start-up applying artificial intelligence, algorithmic science and machine learning to cyber security, announced that Dell will integrated its technology into Dell Data Security solutions. This collaboration builds on the Dell Ventures investment in Cylance earlier this year.